The Faithful and the Flightless
by thorfinn965
Summary: In which Loki and Sigyn, in separate prisons on opposite sides of the Yggdrasil, somehow manage to find each other again thanks to the Convergence. Loki/Sigyn. (Thor 2 spoilers!)
1. Chapter 1: Loyalty Lost

**_Chapter One: Loyalty Lost_**

Life in prison was… _boring._ There was nothing to do but skim through books he had already read a thousand times and think about how different his future could have been, if not for the Allfather's lies. There was nothing to see but the plain white walls of his cell and the darkened corridor beyond. There was nothing to hear but his own mind, screaming about his confinement in silence, although he kept his outward appearance as cold and collected as ever.

Once upon a time, Loki had been able to sit in the same spot for hours, so long as he had a book. The words had been enough to satisfy him, to give wings to his imagination and let it take flight, allowing him to live vicariously through the tales of Asgard's ancient heroes until that day when he could have real adventures of his own.

But now was different. He'd _had _adventures. He had seen all Nine Realms and traveled farther than most of Asgard's inhabitants could even dream of. He had fallen through the starry branches of the Yggdrasil and risen again, stronger than ever. He had held power, true power, in his hands. He had almost been a king. And now… Now he was expected to resign himself to a life behind bars? A life in prison, never again able to speak to his mother, or see his brother, or ride to another realm, or feel starlight on his skin, or play tricks, or run, or hide…

That was no life at all.

How could he endure months, years, _centuries_ of this? He would go mad—at least, madder than they already thought he was. Yet the strange thing was, he didn't feel mad. Reckless, maybe, and angry, but those weren't really the same thing. And more than anything else, he simply felt empty. Odin had disowned him (not that he cared), Frigga was forbidden to see him (of course), Thor had left him to rot in the dungeons (which didn't surprise him), and _she_ was in a different dungeon, one darker and deeper than his own.

Was this how she had felt, all those long years of her imprisonment? He could imagine her pacing back and forth along the rough stone walls of her cell, wearing the soles off of her boots, then continuing to pace until the bottoms of her feet were torn and bloody. She would twist her head and pull back her teeth to scent a wind that no longer blew, like a wild animal trapped in a cage, but she would never speak, never raise her voice. It was not her way to curse and shout—she was silent, like a ghost yet living.

Loki was stretched out on his cot which, while it was small and thin, was probably more comfortable than whatever bed the Allfather had given her. They treated him well enough in Asgard, if only because of Frigga. His cell was neat and clean, his clothes were washed on a regular basis, and his food was decently prepared. He certainly didn't lack for reading material. It could have been worse, much worse.

He grabbed the cup of water off his bedside table and drained it in one quick swallow, then proceeded to toss it over his head, catching it effortlessly as it tumbled back down again. Toss… and catch. Toss… and catch. Toss… He sighed, wondering what the sky looked like. He thought it was afternoon, but he had lost track of time days ago. Catching the goblet, he flicked it upwards again. What book to read today? Maybe that one over in the corner, but it was small, maybe a few hundred pages at most. He'd be done with it in less than an hour. The goblet fell back down again. After spinning it around in his fingers, he threw it once more, looking for a different option.

A sound came from further in the dungeon, but Loki ignored it. There was always someone grunting, or screaming, or crying, or trying to kill his inmate. At least Loki had a cell to himself.

_Probably because no one would want to share one with me,_ he thought with a wry grimace, trapping the goblet and batting it away again. There was only one person in the Nine Realms he would even remotely consider being imprisoned for eternity with, and the Allfather had already jailed her somewhere even Loki could not go.

The sound came again, but this time it was different. It was a shattering, a crackling, like the breaking of glass… or a forcefield. A forcefield like the ones that sealed the cells.

A jailbreak. That was something new.

With a lazy, almost nonchalant air, Loki caught the goblet and set it back down on the table, then slowly stretched and rose to his feet. Folding his arms, he strode over to the window forcefield of his own cell and leaned up against the wall. Sure enough, something was happening further down the corridor. Guards were yelling and running, prisoners were banging on the walls, somewhere more forcefields were being destroyed…

Well, good luck to whoever was trying to escape. People had tried to break out of Asgard's dungeons before, and they had never succeeded. They were captured, brought before the Allfather's throne, and thrown into the Empty Realms—deserted, lifeless pockets of existence between the worlds. The Empty Realms were anomalies, things that should not technically exist at all. They opened once and closed forever, not even accessible by the Bifrost. You were thrown into the nearest of these realms, the cosmos shifted, the realm was sealed, and you were stranded there for eternity.

Better to rot in Asgard, where at least there were books and the chance of seeing Frigga, than to spend eternity in an Empty Realm. Unless, of course, it was the same Empty Realm _she_ had been thrown into.

Loki turned his back on the skirmish raging through the dungeon and slumped down against his cell wall, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting his head on his knees. What use was it trying to escape? Where would he go? What would he do? The Nine Realms didn't want him—none of them did. Jotunheim had cast him out long ago, Asgard held no promise of a future, Midgard would not bow before him… Did he really think Vanaheim would take him? Or Alfheim? Or even Nidavellir or Svartalfheim? Niflheim belonged to the dead, which for all the hopelessness of his situation he was not yet willing to join, and Muspelheim was a world of fire, no place for a frost giant…

His hand trailed listlessly along the floor, feeling the smooth white tile. And then, all of a sudden, it wasn't tile beneath his fingertips. It was the battered leather cover of a book. A small, worn, water-damaged book.

Maybe reading would help him block out the flashes of light beyond his cell. He scooped up the thin manuscript and flipped it open to a random page, not even bothering to glance at the title, and began to read.

_Loyalty… What a useless thing. The servant is loyal to the king, but does the king return his faith? When there's money to be gotten, or lands to be conquered, does it bother the king what price the servant pays? The son is loyal to the father, but what does the father care? He lies with every breath he takes, leaving his son to fend for himself in the cruel world, so long as _he_ prospers. The lady is loyal to her lord, but what happens when he goes off to war? He leaves her behind without a second thought to sit and sew and weave, while he sees the worlds. _

_ What is the good of loyalty if it has only one side? Would it not be easier to make no commitments, take no vows, swear no oaths? If people do not listen to the voice in their heads, what's the point of having a conscience in the first place?_

_ I tried to be loyal. I tried to keep my faith, I really did. But the worlds are fallen and darkness risen, and look where loyalty got me. A pit of a cell in an empty world, forever in darkness, forever in silence, with only my thoughts to keep me company._

Loki skimmed through the rest of the book, his brows furrowing in confusion. Why would Frigga give him a book like this? All the others were about magic, or adventure, or history…

He flipped to the front cover, but the leather was smooth and blank, declaring neither a title nor the identity of the author. So he turned to the first page instead, only to find that that had no words either.

_Useless,_ he thought, about to throw the book across the cell and go back to watching the guards running back and forth through the dungeons, when something caught his eye.

Thin grey lines were tracing their way across the paper, spreading out from where his thumb rested on the tattered vellum page. They ran like water, dancing and leaping, twining together until they formed a simple passage of runes:

_Identity confirmed: Loki Laufeyson._

Okay, books weren't supposed to do that. The words were supposed to already be written, not magically appear out of thin air. And they weren't supposed to know his name either. He was on the verge of throwing it away again, this time wary that it was some new scheme of Odin's to trick him into confessing his crimes, but then the runes melted back into fluid grey lines.

He watched, hypnotized, oblivious to the fighting taking place mere feet away from him. Pictures began to form—a galloping horse, dancing feet, stars sparkling in the night sky, hands touching, a feather tumbling slowly downwards…

Then they resolved themselves into words once again.

_Hello, love._

* * *

**_Author's Note: _**

**_Hey there, thanks for reading! This is me being bad and not working on my NaNoWriMo because of Thor 2 feels, so it could end one of two ways: either I get my motivation for NaNo back and this doesn't get updated until December, or I don't and this gets a new chapter every day. We'll see. _**

**_Oh, and to the extent of my knowledge, 'the Empty Realms' don't actually exist in Norse mythology or MCU..._**


	2. Chapter 2: Separate Worlds

**_Chapter Two: Separate Worlds_**

_ Hello, love._

Two words. Two words were all it took to make his heart leap into his throat. The runes were scrawling themselves across the page faster now, keeping time with his racing pulse.

_Isn't prison boring? At least you, I presume, are in Asgard instead of locked in some puny bubble world barely larger than the Allfather's throne room. And _you _can still see people—all I've seen for two years are stones and stars._

_ Ach, we'll compare prison stories later. Mine will be worse, don't bother trying to outdo them. _

_ Now you'll be wondering what this is, won't you? Even _you've_ never seen a book like this one before. I've enchanted it so that this message will appear only with your touch, and after activation it'll link you directly to my diary. Whatever I write, you can see. I call it a mirror-book. I'm pretty sure that I invented it. Unfortunately, I haven't figured out how you can write back yet, so for once in your life you're just going to have to shut up and listen to me._

_ The Convergence is coming, when all Nine Realms will align. From what I can see of the stars from here, my realm is orbiting Svartalfheim, and I'm counting on the fact that it's going to be pulled into the Convergence along with the inhabited realms. When the walls between the worlds fall apart, I _should_ be able to escape, but I'm going to need an anchor. The walls separating an Empty Realm will never disappear completely, not even with the Convergence—I'm going to have to use my power to tear them down, and to do that I'm going to need someone on the other side who I can latch onto so I don't end up falling into empty space._

_ In other words, be on Svartalfheim in two days' time. With the walls thinning, I'll be able to find you there. _

_ See you soon._

The grey lines stood still for a moment, almost vibrating with intensity, then collapsed together in the middle of the page to form an imprint of her lips. They parted slightly, almost as though she was blowing him a kiss, and then vanished completely.

"Sigyn," he whispered, running his hand over the vellum in disbelief, wondering if he had imagined the whole thing. But then he picked up his hand and looked at his thumb, and there was a swirling grey mark where the strange ink had rubbed off on his finger. "I'm coming, Sig."

Two days wasn't much time to find a way to escape from Asgard, not when he was under constant supervision and the Allfather was just waiting for him to make a prison break—

A prison break.

Like the one that was happening at that very moment.

Loki tucked the mirror-book into his shirt, right next to his heart, and rose slowly to his feet, struggling to keep his expression neutral. It would not do to look too excited, too suspicious…

He needn't have bothered. The only guards left in dungeons were either corpses on the floor or a few ragged survivors struggling against the mass of ex-prisoners trying to force their way out up the main stairway.

Where was the one who had started this, the prisoner who had shattered the first forcefield? Perhaps he had already gone by Loki's cell, but something told the god of mischief that was not the case.

The thud of a giant's footsteps drew his attention from the flashes of light and screams of dying men at the end of the tunnel. But this was no familiar giant that strode into his view, with blue skin and bright red eyes. In fact, this was no giant at all. It was a monster out of nightmare, a massive warrior in a tusked, bestial helm with skin that seemed more fire than flesh, who was unperturbed by the swords biting into his armor and cared not whether the person he killed was an Asgardian or a fellow prisoner.

The helmeted face turned to stare at Loki, the depthless eye sockets searching the god of mischief's gaze for… for _something._

It was impossible. Loki recognized that power emanating from the monster in black waves of energy, that molten lava look of his skin, that strangely terrifying helmet—but only from books. The Dark Elves had been defeated, slaughtered, they and the order of the Kursed were no more…

And yet, here was one of the Kursed standing before him, seemingly offering him an escape from his prison. Was this the answer to how he was supposed to get to Svartalfheim in time for the Convergence? Help the monster get out of Asgard? Could it really be so simple?

Frigga's old warning echoed in his mind. _Don't make a deal with a Dark Elf_, she had always told him, even though she had not yet been born when that race had been vanquished. They were vile, untrustworthy creatures, interested in only darkness and destruction… To make a deal with them was to court death.

Loki stared at the Kursed elf, debating whether or not he should follow Frigga's advice, but in the end it was the Dark Elf who made the decision for him when it turned away from Loki's cell and continuing on towards the main dungeon entrance where the fighting was thickest. The god of mischief was going to have to find another way to get to Svartalfheim.

"If I were you, I'd take the stairs to left," Loki called out to the monster, smirking as it followed his advice. He cared not whether the thing that had once been an elf made it out of Asgard alive, but the longer it was on the loose and occupying the guards, the longer he had to figure out his own plan of escape.

The citadel would be in turmoil now, what with the inmates and guards battling through the dungeons and the Kursed elf trying to flee Asgard. Of course, when he heard that the prisoners had broken out, the Allfather would immediately assume Loki had been responsible. Maybe it would be better to wait, at least a few hours, before starting his own breakout. Once Odin had seen that Loki wasn't responsible for this newest catastrophe, once he realized there was a Kursed elf running loose in the citadel, _then_ the god of mischief would make his move. But how to escape, when Asgard would be on high alert? It would be easier to wait until events had died down and the guards became lax, thinking he was resigned to his fate, but he did not have the luxury of time. If he didn't get to Svartalfheim in two days' time, Sigyn would be lost forever, and he would truly have nothing to live for anymore.

Leaning up against the side of his cell, Loki pulled out Sigyn's mirror-book. She always had the best plans, simple and straightforward. Perhaps she had left him some word of advice.

He opened up to the last page and read the only word written there.

_Brother._

"Really, Sig?" he hissed, slamming the book shut. "That's your brilliant plan?"

Loki would never ask Thor for his help. He would rather rot in prison than beg his adopted brother to set him free. Besides, Thor had abandoned him, left him alone in the dungeons without so much as a word. It had been weeks since his imprisonment, and not once had his one-time brother come to visit him. The last time Loki had seen Thor, it had been when he dragged him back to Asgard in chains.

At their parting, when Thor had handed him over to the guards, he had said not a word. He hated Loki for what he had done in New York—for Coulson's murder—and Loki could not blame him for that. But at the same time, hadn't there been the glimmer of a tear in his brother's eye when Loki was marched off to prison? Or had he just imagined it? Could it possibly be that Thor still had feelings for his adopted brother, even after all he had done?

What if Loki were to fake illness, or even death? Would Thor demand to see him? Maybe then he could manipulate the oaf into smuggling him out of the dungeons, so that he could see the stars "one last time." Thor had enough honor that he couldn't refuse Loki's "dying wish," and from there it should be fairly simple to delude him and make for Svartalfheim. After all, the secret passage was in the mountains surrounding the citadel…

Loki smiled to himself, his first real smile in years. "Oh yes, Sigyn, I'm coming."

* * *

Somewhere beyond the known realms, in a world that consisted of a single rocky canyon and not much else, a figure stirred in the shadows. Years of eternal darkness, broken only by the faint glow of starlight, had bleached her skin whiter than bone and leeched all the color from her once-blond hair. Grey eyes that used to look so pale in her face now seemed impossibly dark by comparison. The woman jokingly called Asgard's Ghost in her youth had become a ghost in truth.

A thin hand reached for the book on the ground that was finally glowing with soft green light and tucked it into the tattered remains of her dress. She loped to the front of the cave, the thick callouses on her soles preventing her feet from feeling the sharp rocks beneath them, and gazed out at her small world.

At the bottom of the canyon wound the silver ribbon of a river, her only source of water, while above her head towered the rough canyon walls. To the east and the west, the stars glimmered in the voids where her world simply stopped, the rocks vanishing into thin air. There were no trees, no plants, no animals, nothing but stone and starlight…

"Soon," Sigyn whispered to the sky, her voice cracking from disuse. "I'm coming, Loki."

* * *

**Author's Note: I've come to a conclusion. I'll update this on days when I'm caught up with NaNoWriMo, and hopefully that will give me some much-needed motivation... Thanks for reading!**


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